My Embodiment
by Craig Morgan Teicher

Read the automated transcript.

Look down. Look at your body,
how it falls from your head

like water dumped
from a bucket—is that you?

What does that body have to do
with your many, many thoughts?

It carries your thoughts
around with it. Have you ever

had a thought in your leg?
Yes—when you were running.

When a thought was in
your hand, you wrote it down

or shaped an urn of clay.
You never shaped an urn.

An urn for ashes, the ashes
of the dead—your body

never thinks of death
but it carries your thoughts

of death like something wrapped
and delicate, something precious—

death must be very precious
or else why carry it

all your life like an egg.
Nothing will hatch—why carry it?

Describe your body: two legs
wear denim pants—why?

One arm holds a pen
while the other steadies

a notebook. And all of it
supports your head, which rides

your body like a prince
held aloft in his sedan chair.

There is also a torso in a
blue shirt; it rests atop

your legs—why bother
telling what everyone knows?

Because these are your thoughts—
they reach for your body

and you want them to be more
than its invisible cargo.

Because you recognize
your thoughts—they are always

before your eyes, but
your body is still a surprise.

"My Embodiment" by Craig Morgan Teicher, from BRENDA IS IN THE ROOM & OTHER POEMS by Craig Morgan Teicher, copyright © 2007 The Center for Literary Publishing at Colorado State University. Used by permission of The Center for Literary Publishing at Colorado State University.